Letters to an Absent Father
by MandyQ Writes
Summary: Ash can sort of remember his father – the warm, bright fur of a Jolteon, smiling dark eyes, and a protective presence - who is never around. When he sets off for his journey, Ash starts writing to him in his journal. Light pokéshipping. Mostly in chronological order. C2 updated.
1. Missing his family

**Letters to an Absent Father**

Note from MandyQ: Loosely inspired by Mare Odomo's _Letters to an Absent Father_. Anyone reading this should check out his work at his Deviantart (mareodomo) or his tumblr (mareodomo). The comic strips are amazingly touching, and focuses on Ash's absent father and the advice and help and all the talks they could have had. (I might have teared over a non-official comic strip of a cartoon I was once obsessed with).

You can read the first comic strip here ( art/Letters-To-An-Absent-Father-01-191872044).

* * *

Love isn't something that Ash thinks consciously about much at all. It comes to him as naturally as breathing – he loves his mother most of all of course, and he loves Pikachu, his Pika-pal, and he loves his friends. Misty and Brock are fast becoming the best friends he's ever had, and he feels closer to them than even Gary, who he's known for most of his childhood.

Brock is strong and supportive, and like an older brother he can go to for advice. Sometimes he thinks Misty's only following him for her bike, but mostly Misty is possibly his best human friend, who is an enigma and a girl that he bickers with. Pikachu is his best friend, who loves him unconditionally, and will never leave him, and that is all Ash needs to know to love them.

His mother was always _there_ until he set off on his journey, and right now, she is his home to return to. But although she smiles for him, before he left, and now when he calls, he can see that air of sadness around her when she thinks he isn't looking. Ash _knows_ it's about his dad. She will never say anything, and Ash never knows how to talk about it.

His dad isn't there, but Ash hopes he'll be there one day.

After his friends go to sleep, Ash quietly - or as quietly as he can manage - slips out of his sleeping bag, gently setting Pikachu back onto the makeshift bed. He is careful to avoid brushing against Misty, who is curled up in her bedroll next to them. As he removes his favourite black pen (it is an Official Indigo League Pen), and his red journal from his backpack, he freezes for a moment when Brock suddenly lets out a loud snort from across the dying embers of their small fire-pit.

When the older boy snorts again more softly and turns over, and Misty seems to not have awoken, Ash lights his torch, uncaps his pen, and starts writing.

* * *

 _Dear Dad,_

 _Today, Misty, Brock and I saw a huge group butterfree set off to start new families. Did you know that they had to cross the sea to do that?_

 _I let Butterfree go, so that he could find a mate and start a family and…have kids. He had trouble at first, and then Team Rocket tried to steal all the butterfree away! But we got them out, thanks to Butterfree and Starmie, and then, Butterfree managed to win over the pink butterfree he had a crush on, which made me really happy until I remembered he would have to leave._

 _On a cliff, by the sea, I watched my Butterfree…and his mate, disappear into the sunset. I kinda wanted to cry, but Misty always knows how to cheer me up, Brock always knows what to say, and I'll always have Pikachu. He let me cuddle him to sleep because I was so sad even though he says I squeeze him too tight sometimes._

 _When we made camp, Brock made my favourite lazy-boy-no-chew stew, and Misty was extra nice. She smiled more, and only got a little annoyed when I stole her hair tie. It was nice, and I'll grow stronger, so that Butterfree will be proud of me when we see each other again._

 _Do you ever miss mum?_

 _I know I miss her._

 _Love,_

 _Ash_

End Letter One.

* * *

Hope everyone is willing to suspend a little disbelief that Ash Ketchum can write so cleanly. Heh. I did try to stimulate trains of thought and rambling with his run-on sentences – I hope I succeeded! Do let me know if I screwed up any grammatical rules too badly; reviews and constructive criticism and any sort of feedback are very, very welcome.

The second chapter of _Confessions_ will probably be up this weekend, I hope.


	2. A Good Trainer

Outskirts of Pewter City, 6.38 AM.

* * *

Ash has always been a reckless kid, and he tends not to think about consequences. It was normal to give in to instincts that suggested that it was good idea to swipe a extra cookie from a batch his mother baked for neighbours, or sneak in close to watch wild pokémon, or to stay up late when he has school the next morning. Or a trainer's day appointment with Professor Oak.

When he and Gary were still friends, and Leaf was around, the three of them would get into trouble for sneaking into the nearby woods, or into Professor Oak's lab, or skipping classes. Usually, Professor Oak or Leaf's uncle or aunt would catch them after hearing crashing and banging , it _might_ just have been Ash's fault for forgetting to write a note, or being clumsy. But he mostly blamed Gary's big, fat mouth for their getting into trouble, like how Gary blamed him.

Leaf blamed both of them for fighting and being noisy.

Impulsiveness and apologising are two things that Ash has issues with, even though he loves his mum, and sort of loves his friends. He will always feel sad and sorry for hurting his mum, no matter whose fault it is that they broke their new fishing rods fighting over an old pokéball, but he, Gary and Leaf tend to give each other the silent treatment rather than admit that they are wrong or apologise.

The day before they reach Pewter City, Ash wakes before Misty. He can see by the way that her breath sends her soft, red fringe fluttering that she's still asleep, and from the way Pikachu has curled up so that its back is to that rising sun that it isn't getting up soon either.

As he gets dressed, he cinches on his trainer belt, and brushes his fingers over the pokéballs sitting in the notches – Butterfree and Pidgeotto are probably still sleeping too (and they deserve it), his fingers lingering over the battered one with a clumsily etched worm on it. He settles against a tree stump to wait, and starts writing.

* * *

 _Dear Dad,_

 _I don't know if you know it, but I set off on my Pokémon journey about a week ago. It's been tougher than I thought it would be. Did you ever get lost in the woods when you first started out?_

 _I met a girl called Misty. She's ten too, and loves water Pokémon, and she's terrified of bugs, including Caterpie. She has red hair, and green eyes that are kinda misty, I guess. It's nice to have someone to travel with and talk to, even if she's mean sometimes. But like I said. She's annoyingly smart (don't tell her I said that), and I hadn't thought much about what she said to me, about how I'm inexperienced and a bad trainer who could hurt his pokémon, until today._

 _Today, in the middle of a forest clearing, I finally had my first proper battle_ _. A bug-catcher called Samurai just appeared from nowhere and challenged me. I bet I would have beat him because Metapod's Harden move is really strong, but we got interrupted by some beedrill that stole Metapod._

 _I ran away and left Metapod behind._

 _But I did go back. I was kind of scared, but Metapod evolved to protect me._ _And we got through it together (with the help of his sleep powder)._

 _I managed to argue a little less with Misty too, when we set up camp, 'cause I offered to get the water without her shouting at me. It was a little less rough last night, which made Pikachu happier._

 _I miss you._

 _Love,_

 _Ash_

End letter 2.

* * *

EP04: Where Ash gets into his first proper battle and gets into a "harden" contest.

But yeah, I really enjoyed watching Ash get actual character development. I think EP02 had Delia mention Ash's father taking ridiculously long to get to Viridian City, and how he would be proud of Ash, which again begs the questions about how is Ash's father doing now? And how bad a trainer was his dad? And although I'm writing this partially to get into Ash's head, and partially to consider the role of proper father figure(s) for Ash, I'm curious whether (if what Delia says is true) his dad would have been that great a dad regardless - he sounds really irresponsible himself...

Any thoughts on who Ash's father is?

This technically takes place before Chapter 1, but I wanted to do Mare Odomo's first strip first. Oops.

Not very sure about the split-in-half-letter-half-thoughts-about-Ash format I have though (and the phrasing/ framing of Ash's letter)?

As always, reviews and constructive criticism in particular are highly appreciated. ;)


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